GT Post Walsall

Graham Turner reflected on his discontent of his side’s performance as they were gunned down 1-0 by near neighbours Walsall in blustery conditions at Greenhous Meadow.

Milan Lalkovic netted the only goal of the game for the Saddlers just after the break, with Tom Eaves missing a great chance to level matters from almost underneath the crossbar a while later.

“I’m bitterly disappointed with the manner in which we played, it was as simple as that,” said Turner.

“We had a couple of good chances in the first few minutes and should’ve gone in one up.

“After the opening stages when Goz had that chance, we never performed for an hour. We had a little flurry after the goal, but it was nowhere near good enough.

“We had a little flurry when the subs went on. We picked up a bit of pace, got ourselves into one or two good positions and should’ve scored when Tom Eaves put one over the bar. It was a very good chance and we should’ve been level.”

Town won their last outing 3-1 two weeks ago at Stevenage and Turner was puzzled to why his side went from such a positive showing, to such a poor one.

“We were a shadow of the side that played at Stevenage in terms of our work, in terms of what we put into it and in terms of our ability to pass the ball and control it. I think that’s the disappointing part of it.

“When you go away from home and get the first away win and play quite well and dominate for long periods to throwing in a performance like that was a mystery, but it was poor.”

Defeat to the Saddlers is just Town’s third at home of the season, but marks back-to-back home losses after succumbing to Oldham.

“The previous two home defeats against Wolves, which was a good performance, and Oldham, which was a reasonable performance, I think we were very unlucky to lose those games – but I have no complaints at all about the result today. We were poor.”